Kind of Music

There is a someone emerging these glistening days, onethat I vaguely remember, onethat I am more than thrilled to re-make the acquaintance of. not even a week into being devoured by College Outdoors I am cheerfully adrift. The girl who led a dozen trips this summer (even though she was scared), the girl who poised threaded her way through Prague and those first foreign foibles, the one who fought doggedly to find truth in st. Petersburg, the one who battled the boys and took on the world way back when at the beginning of the drums and orchestras. Shes reemerged and desperately wants to frolic in the forests, and to be taken seriously. I led my first LC pretrip meeting tonight (OK so Marty and I together, and under the watchful eye of Joe of course), and I have to say it felt really really good. I think I did a good job setting everyone at ease, or atl east I hope so. I learned everyone's names, go through all the risks and logistics information pretty quickly. My spiel could definitly have been better organized, but not bad for the first time through. I cracked myself up privately in the middle of it, when I realized I had just taken a composite of all the best pre-trip meetings I rememberd, and was totally just parotting. I realized somewhere in the middle of pulling gear for people and pulling our group gear for Joe, how good I felt, how comfortable, how at home, how natural. I felt like I'd been doing it for years.

I've been trying to explain lately what kind of different person I am when I'm outdoors and active. How much better, but more than that how much more human I feel. When I'm working outdoors I am the best parts of myself, I feel whole.I am my strongest, most balanced, most vibrant, most self-aware. Outdoors I am focused, I am spontaneous, I am fearless. I am challenged, I am challenging. I am a person whome I enjoy being around. Outside I am in control of the darkness that even still threatens occasionally to encroach on my own horizons. Outside I solve problems, outside I move mountains, kiss boo-boos, hold the world together. Outdoors things don't seem to get to me so quickly, things remain in brilliant perspective. there is a clarity and serenity which I've yet to see paralleled in any other corner of my life, one which I cling to, and revel in. Tonight I had a past which I was proud of, and a future which I crave.

I get to live it this Sunday, tuesday, Saturday, tuesday, and all break. With any luck I'll make enough of a mark and they'll invite me for more come next month. It was cool though, tonight, I met the new warehouse guy and another assistant leader kid, both of whom seemed to know me already. I feel so connected to the outdoor kids, and that commonality is so soothing, and simaltaneously so fufilling.

I miss Chad. And the PT is checking out my knee at therapy in the morning. I'm nervous. I know that upping my mileage from like maybe two a week to 6 or 8 plus the hike onthe weekend is whats causing problems. But inactivity is no longer a viable option, more rest is not a good enough answer. I'm scared of what hes going to tell me, and of what that'll mean for my running and more importantly, my life outdoors. But tommorow is my first training for the Tryon nature guide gig, its late, and I'm doing my damndest to remain positive.